LOCAL GIRL DIES AT SWIMMING POOL

JACKSON -- A 16-year-old Jackson High School student died Friday after suffering an asthma attack at the city pool.

Lori Anne Niswonger of rural Cape Girardeau was a member of the Jackson Swim Team. She was practicing with the team when the attack occurred around 9:30 a.m. Friday.

Coroner John Carpenter said she was swimming and couldn't catch her breath. Her heart then quit pumping.

She was pulled from the pool. One of Niswonger's friends attempted to give her CPR, but she never regained consciousness. She was pronounced dead at 10:21 a.m. at Southeast Missouri Hospital.

Carpenter said such attacks can come on suddenly. "That is the bad part about it. You never know when it is going to happen or how bad it is going to get."

Niswonger was a junior at Jackson High School, where she was active in track and marching band.

She was a member of New Life World Outreach Center in Cape Girardeau.

Members of her church family described her as caring and outgoing.

"She had a lot of friends," said her friend Heather Warren of Scott City.

Warren said Niswonger never mentioned the asthma. "I never even knew she had it," she said.

June Swift directed Niswonger's youth group.

"She was real lively, just full of energy," Swift recalled Saturday.

She said Niswonger was always ready to lend a hand. "She was a good example of what teen-agers ought to be."

She went door to door in South Cape last summer, inviting children to attend vacation Bible school.

"She loved sports. She was very athletic," Swift said.

Her death shocked friends and family.

But Swift said God would see them through the crisis. "They all know they will see Lori again, and they all know she is happy running around in heaven."